A wide array of microorganisms, including many novel, phylogenetically deeply rooted taxa,
survive and thrive in extreme environments. These unique and reduced-complexity …

Studying within-species variation has traditionally been limited to culturable bacterial
isolates and low-resolution microbial community fingerprinting. Metagenomic sequencing …

Industrialization, population burst, and changing lifestyles have resulted in the genesis of
non-degradable pollutants languishing the environment and human health. Biological …

Effective clearance of an infection requires that the immune system rapidly detects and
neutralizes invading parasites while strictly avoiding self-antigens that would result in …

Horizontal genetic transfer (HGT) has played an important role in bacterial evolution at least
since the origins of the bacterial divisions, and HGT still facilitates the origins of bacterial …

Genetic exchange is common among bacteria, but its effect on population diversity during
ecological differentiation remains controversial. A fundamental question is whether …

Many bacterial and archaeal lineages have a history of extensive and ongoing horizontal
gene transfer and loss, as evidenced by the large differences in genome content even …

Microcystis is a cyanobacterium that forms toxic blooms in freshwater ecosystems around
the world. Biological variation among taxa within the genus is apparent through genetic and …

The bacteria in the fruitfly Drosophila melanogaster of different life stages was quantified by
454 pyrosequencing of 16S rRNA gene amplicons. The sequence reads were dominated by …

The study of the microbial ecology of drinking water distribution systems (DWDS) has
traditionally been based on culturing organisms from bulk water samples. The development …